Bedlam

Context

Bedlam (Jesse Aaronson) was a minor superhuman mutant in the Marvel Universe. He was introduced in 1998, almost solely appeared as a member of this era’s X-Force team, and was reportedly killed in 2003.

Background

Group Affiliation: X-Force, former member of M.U.S.E. (Mutant Underground Support Engine).

Base Of Operations:

Height: 5’10” Weight: 180 lbs. Age: 19

Eyes: Brown Hair: Black

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Powers and Abilities

Bedlam’s ability is to generate a bioelectric field around him that interferes with the workings of electronics and machinery. Originally, he could simply shut off or scramble anything from a building’s power supply to a car’s engine, but was severely restricted as to range (a few yards, AFAICT).

Under the tutelage of Pete Wisdom, Bedlam can set off an EMP that can scramble electronics for nearly ½ mile (in DC Heroes RPG terms, Neutralize). He can also focus that EMP as an attack that can also scramble the neural functioning of a person or people (Mind Blast).

History

Orphaned at age five, he was separated from his brother Chris by the fostering system. Jesse was later exploited by a doctor when his powers manifested. Finally, he was rescued by Xavier’s Mutant Underground (MUSE),which cared for him and trained him as a field agent.

Jesse desperately wanted to find his brother. Unfortunately, MUSE’s opinion was that Chris simply didn’t exist, as all evidence had been mysteriously erased. So Jesse left M.U.S.E and tracked down Domino.

He cut a deal with Dom. If she would help find his brother, Christopher, he would give her the location of Ekatarina Gryaznova. She was the Sentinel who had implanted Domino with a neural disruption device that shorted out her powers. Domino agreed to take his case.

Jesse disrupted the neural disrupter on Domino’s spine for her. Along the way they ran into trouble, but Jesse escaped and brought in X-Force to help. Gryaznbova was defeated, and Jesse became a member of the team.

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X-Force

With his somewhat nosy personality, he found it hard to fit in. With the rediscovery of Christopher, now in charge of the new Hellions, Jesse had to choose between his friends and his family.

Jesse originally sided with Christopher, but soon found out his brother’s dream was warped and that his brother was a class-A loon. As a result, he sided with X-Force once again and helped the team defeat King Bedlam’s new Hellions.

Under the training of Pete Wisdom, he was learning how to use his powers to a more advanced degree. In their first mission, however, Wisdom was killed by the mad geneticist, Nilas Roman.

X-Force continued to operate without him for many months. They even faked their own deaths and acted as a pro-mutant terrorism group, going so far as to kill groups and companies that abused and killed mutants.

X-Force no more

However after a disastrous encounter with Wisdom’s sister, Romany, X-Force broke up and went their separate ways. But they still got into a fight with the new media-friendly X-Force (now X-Statix) over the team’s name.

According to uncannyxmen.net , Jesse Bedlam may have died in Uncanny X-Men #423. That was presumably when certain other members of X-affiliated teams, such as Skin of Generation X, were crucified by the Church of Humanity.

AFAICT, the body was never identified as such, since at least Skin was identified as killed, but Bedlam’s name wasn’t mentioned.

In any event, he is not listed among the members of X-Corporation. Thus he is not active, if he did, in fact, survive.

Description

Jesse originally wore his hair in short dreads, and had a goatee. His uniform was dark blue bodysuit over which he wore white armor sections.

His new X-Force uniform is leather trousers and boots, over which he wears a red T-shirt emblazoned with a huge ’X‘ symbol in white, and a tight leather jacket with zippered sleeves. His hands are wrapped in some sort of cloth wrappings (even the fingers), and he has cut his hair very short, with ’X’s’ dyed into the sides.

Personality

Jesse “Bedlam” Aaronson can be a pain in the butt. His major personality quirk is that he is always sticking his nose in where it doesn’t belong (i.e., into the personal lives of his teammates). He would then give all sorts of unwanted advice (usually bad).

Jesse is a stalwart team player, but unlike the other X-Force members,is just not as gung-ho heroic. He needs the support of a family structure to function normally, whether it is X-Force, MUSE, or his brother Christopher.

When the “family” lets him down or does not live up to his expectations, he is apt to seek another. For instance he left MUSE when they wouldn’t find his brother, then left his brother for X-Force when he realized what a kook he was.

Jesse should improve with time (and is).

DC Universe History

The original New Mutants are so interconnected with the history of the X-Men and Xavier’s school that unless you have included these, it would be hard to insert them into the DCU.

However, the new version of the team, more concerned with the conspiracy against mutants, could be placed whole cloth into a DC campaign with little trouble. As long as you ignore a lot of the background as excess baggage.

I see them as being in a way connected with the “Secret Era”, but with a modern twist. They are a deep undercover group that maintains watch on possible plots against mutant kind, and stomps on the sparks as they erupt.

Drawbacks:
Arch-Enemy (his brother Christopher, aka King Bedlam), Mistrust (Mutant),Secret Identity, Uncertainty, Socially Inept, MPI (Jesse suffers from someform of bipolar disorder that is currently controlled with medication,caused by the interaction of his EM Powers and his own brain’s electrochemical field).

Previous statistics

Jesse has little history to go on so far, but for the pre-Wisdom X-Force, delete Mind Blast, and reduce Neutralize to 13.

New rules – Reduced Range: -1 FC

This limitation is used to simulate an effect that is far in excess of its Range – e.g. Cyclop’s Optic Blast may be 13 AP’s, but no way can he fire it at a range of 8 miles). This limitation halves the number of AP’s used to determine range, rounded where necessary (up or down is up to GM/Player decision, based on the needs of the game a/o player). E.g., Cyclops has Energy Blast 13, his range is 6, about 200 yards.